Tuesday, 9 August 2016

CHAMPAGNE

What is Champagne if we discard the ever-so-confusing concept of it?

From my experience, Champagne largely delivers, and in fact to be brave, it exceeds our expectations; regretably OFTEN. Worse, however, is, that Champagne sets the bar so high, which it OFTEN naturally exceeds it, that our disappointment of it, should it fail to deliver, deepens profoundly.

My initial phrase is altered, albeit borrowed from Leo Tolstoy, who questioned: What is art if we discard the ever-so-confusing concept of beauty?

To ruin the allure, to ruin everything I knew of Champagne when I found out what it was, I realised, that Champagne isn't really just a drink but it is people! This however, made my quest to undestand it a lot more difficult; instead of understanding Champagne, I had to learn to understand people; through Champagne.

Although with great disdain of myself I must confess that Champagne became somewhat secondary, and my interest in understanding people's motivations to drink it, to slander it, to rave about it to succumb it deepened beyond expectations. I had absolutely no clue, that through Champagne I would be exploring peoples' motivations to drink it, to love it and ultimately create the myth and the allure around it.

But why is it so, that Champagne, discarding the bubbles still holds such a profound place in our lives? Yes, marketing aside, because Champagne became bigger much before marketing was even an option of business, it does make me wonder if Champagne wasn't actually the birth place of both, marketing and brand identity development.

My intention is to keep my reader in suspence; partly because I want to add value to the discovery, but to be realistic, it is crucial to understand that Champagne as a drink is totally subject to our views, not the other way around.